


Longest Way Around

by AuditoryCheesecake



Series: A Cheesecake's Tumblr Shorts [19]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Adoribull - Freeform, Divine Victoria - Freeform, Fluff, M/M, Minor Cassandra Pentaghast/Varric Tethras, Old Friends, Old Married Couple, Post-post Trespasser
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-13
Updated: 2016-10-13
Packaged: 2018-08-22 04:49:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8273545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AuditoryCheesecake/pseuds/AuditoryCheesecake
Summary: There's nothing like saving the world together to create lasting friendships.Dorian and Bull travel south to celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of Divine Victoria's coronation.





	

**Author's Note:**

> The title is from [ "Going Home the Longest Way Around"](http://patschneider.com/pat/going-home-the-longest-way-around-by-pat-schneider/) by Pat Schneider, and so was the overall inspiration.

In the twenty-five years since her ascension, Divine Victoria has written to Dorian hundreds of times, made use of the Inquisitor’s sending crystal four times, sent Varric with eight illicit messages and requested that he keep calling her Cassandra with each individual communication. He obliges her, except in their most formal letters, and except for when it becomes essential to tease her Perfection for her lofty station.

The invitations he and Bull receive to her Jubilee Anniversary celebration are the perfect combination of both. The ink shimmers gold, the edges of the wax seal are likewise gilded, and their titles and stations are enumerated in handwriting so intricate as to be illegible. Dorian has no hope of escalation, but he does his level best.

_To her Perfection, advocate of Andraste on earth, exalted servant of the Maker, bright guiding star of Thedas and benevolent patroness of the Inquisition, her Most Holiness Divine Victoria,_

_We gladly accept your kind invitation._

_With great affection, we remain your devoted friends and allies, Magister Dorian Pavus of Qarinus, Vice-Chancellor to Archon Tilani, Ambassador to the Inquisition, Senior Enchanter of the Circle of Minrathous, Professor Emeritus of the Circle of Cumberland, and the Iron Bull, Captain of the Bull’s Chargers, (as the name might imply)_

They arrive in Val Royeaux a week before the official celebrations begin, with relatively little fanfare. They are inducted through the main gates of the city by only four guards dressed in modest but unmistakable regalia, and are guided directly to the Divine’s private lodgings.

They have time to stow their bags, shake the wrinkles from their formal clothes and sit down on a sweet little terrace with a tall, cage-like railing that Dorian’s certain Cassandra hates when the Divine’s arrival is announced.

She bursts onto the balcony bare-headed and still pulling off her heavy regalia. Bull and Dorian stand, Bull more slowly, as a harried-looking attendant helps her out of a final piece before Divine Victoria all but slams the door behind the woman.

It’s been nearly two years since they’ve seen each other in person, but Dorian is still a bit startled by the heartiness of her embrace. It’s soon over, though, and she’s on to Bull before Dorian quite knows what’s happened to him. She doesn’t throw herself at him– he’s leaning on a cane after all– but it’s a near thing.

“My friends!” she says, and then again softer, but with a great amount of feeling, “my _friends_. I am so glad to see you. It has been far too long.”

“Hey there, Cass.” Dorian thinks he can hear a servant faint with shock as Bull pats the Divine solidly on the back. “We missed you too.”

They’ve all aged since their glory days– Bull stooping and slowing, Dorian’s hair graying and vision slowly losing sharpness– but unless he sets Cassandra near her coronation portrait (and she hates that) he can never find the difference. Where Sera seems ever young in his memory and never matches the face she has now, Cassandra is as unchanging as onyx.

She is still strong enough to give Bull a resonant thump on his arm. “We are crossing swords at daybreak,” she says. For all it could be a command, it is not. Her smile is wide and she clasps Bulls arm tightly, a warrior’s embrace. “It has been too long since I’ve had a proper sparring partner.”

Bull’s excited nod compels Dorian to interject, “wooden blades, please, for everyone’s peace of mind.”

They turn twin aggrieved frowns on him, prepared to argue, but new servant bows her way onto the balcony. Tea, she informs them with a well-timed bow, is waiting in her Perfection’s solar. 

“Has it been so very trying a month?” Dorian asks as Cassandra leads them up a curling staircase to her private apartments. Doors open and close before he has a chance to touch them, conscientious attendants standing by for that sole task. 

“Not more so than usual. Josephine agreed to let me pay her to plan the party, so my tasks have not been added to overmuch.”

Dorian chuckles. “I can’t imagine your Revered Mothers being overjoyed that an Antivan is charge of such important solemnities.”

She scoffs. “No, they are not. But I can talk about that with anyone. Tell me _your_ news.”

Bull takes charge of the conversation at that. The garden yielded a decent harvest, even though it was tended mostly by Krem and some hired hands as Bull and Dorian spent most of the summer in the capital. There was a short fashion for dawnstone clasps on shoes and shoulders, and Bull won’t let anyone forget it was his doing– he has great plans for what he’ll do next year, with all this new-found influence over the Archon’s court.

Bull lists his objections to Dorian’s latest crop of students. Cesare is too soft to be a Magister, Aida should stop pretending that she doesn’t want to join the Chargers and just ask him (he’ll say no the first two times she does) and Alric might have come all the way from Fereldan to learn necromancy from Dorian, but he needs to either give it up or stop fainting every time Dorian brings out the scalpels. Also, Bull tells her, in the voice that’s convinced at least three Magisters that he’s telling them secret, valuable, and exclusive information, Alric’s pining after Cesare, Cesare’s writing poems to Aida’s eyes, and Aida drops anything she’s holding if Alric so much as looks at her, so, good luck all around.

Cassandra, more inclined to meddle in these things than Bull is, asks what he plans to do about it. 

She’s very put out by his answer of “nothing.”

“But you can see the whole thing from the outside, surely you can help them all to make the best decisions!”

“I know what they each want now, not what’s best in the long run.” Bull shrugs, sipping at the tea. “They’re still kids. A few years down the line, things might be different.”

“You’re not arranging marriages, Amatus.” Dorian’s often thought that Bull would make an excellent matchmaker. “But I agree with Cassandra. At the very least, it would keep my papers in better order.”

“Or worse, if Alric starts making her drop things on purpose,” Bull says, and leans over to offer Dorian the last of the little cake he is holding. “Try this, it’s good.”

Dorian does, cautiously. Bull’s tastes have widened over the years, and while Dorian has complete confidence in Cassandra’s kitchens, he doesn’t agree that brie goes in crab cakes. The little cake, mercifully, is simply chocolate. “Speaking of matchmaking,” he says, “how’s Varric? The last time I heard from him, he was going on a retreat to “focus on his newest manuscript,” but that was some months ago. I imagine the solitude lasted only so long.”

Cassandra, Maker bless her, blushes. “He’s quite well, thank you.” She says no more than that.

Bull leans back on the couch, draping an arm over Dorian’s shoulder. Dorian leans against him, and rolls his eyes when Cassandra smiles at them. “Bring him out from wherever he’s hiding, we’ll play wicked grace.”

“I’m afraid we might not have time for a game until after the celebrations,” she says with an apologetic frown. “I’ve been receiving delegations all morning. In fact–”

“Most Holy, I’m sorry to interrupt.” Cassandra’s chief valet slips into the room. “But the Nevarran ambassador has arrived with his family, and he’s brought you another horse.”

Cassandra sighs. “My cousin. Duty calls, friends.” She rises, and holds out her arms for the robes her attendants bring swiftly forward. 

“Of course.” Dorian and Bull stand with her.

“If you wait here, I may be back in a few hours. Or not.” She sighs again and squares her shoulders. “I’ve made sure your usual rooms are empty, in the east wing. I’m sure you’ll find some way to amuse yourselves in my absence.”

Dorian bows deeply over her hand, and she grasps Bull’s forearm in a mirror of their greeting. “Knock ‘em dead, Cass,” Bull says.

“If only I could.” She sweeps out in a cloud of attendants and hangers-on, head high and face blank.

“I don’t envy her,” Dorian sighs, sitting back down. The sudden exit of Cassandra and her entire flock makes the apartments feel echoing and spacious.“The walking alone would kill me in a week.” 

“It’s no worse than that mess in Minrathous ever was. And she’s got people who do nothing else except rub her feet and file her nails. You might even like it.” Bull lowers himself onto the couch beside him.

“Are you implying that I don’t have someone to rub my feet?” He leans into Bull again, and wraps Bull’s arms around him, feeling Bull’s heartbeat against him, steady and the same as ever.

“I’m implying that I’m not paid to.” He presses a kiss to the top of Dorian’s head. 

“Thank the Maker for that. If I paid you to rub my feet, you’d never have time to focus on rubbing anything else.”

Bull snorts. “Remember when you told me _my_ jokes were bad?”

“Yes, I believe it may have been just this morning. Possibly yesterday?”

“No, it was today, because we passed that sign, however many miles to Montsimmard…” 

“Yes, and you said we should stop for a bit because watching me was making you–”

“Montsi- _hard_ , yeah.” Bull laughs, full-bellied. “We never did stop, though.”

Dorian groans. “Because it’s an awful joke! Not seductive! And we had a schedule to keep to.”

“Well, we’re here now.” Bull tightens his arms a little, stroking Dorian’s side. “Are Cass’s private rooms close enough to a chantry to be out of bounds?”

“What do you think?” Dorian says, but he can’t help but smile. 

“Think you can remember which one’s the east wing?” Bull asks, clearly without the intention of standing up any time soon. “Or should we just stay here for a while?”

“We’ve been traveling for a week,” Dorian responds, which really is an argument for either choice. He’ll haul them off to their own rooms later, though. The couch is criminally comfortable. “Maybe if we wait here long enough Varric will turn up.”

“Been a while since we’ve seen him,” Bull agrees. “Maybe we can get him to sign some books for your assistants. He loves that.”

“I think we’re more likely to get him to just visit us.”

Bull kisses his cheek this time. “You’ve got the best ideas, Kadan.”


End file.
